Little Boy Bow Ties

We have a wedding coming up in our family and I decided a while ago that I was going to make my girls dresses. I had some scraps left so I thought why not make some bow ties for the boys. I think bow ties on little boys are so cute and although I had never made one before I knew they wouldn't be very hard. I had a pretty good idea of how I wanted to make it and what I wanted it to look like but I also knew that I had seen tons of tutorials online for bow ties so I figured I could probably find what I was looking for. I googled it and looked at several before deciding that I wasn't going to find exactly what I was looking for and just needed to make up my own. 

All of the tutorials I looked at were either made for babies, not 4 and 7 year olds like I needed, or they were for a flat bow, I wanted it to be folded/doubled not just a flat rectangle. Others I felt were a weird size and just not the look I was wanting, some seemed really big and almost clownish, others seemed really skinny. So I just decided to make up my own.

There is really nothing new about this tutorial, like I said there are tons of tutorial like this online but this is how I made mine to get the size and look I wanted. They are super quick and easy to make. 

I started with three rectangles:

1- 10"x6" for the bow

1- 3"x4" for the middle piece

1- 2"x about 20" (I cut it long and then cut it down to size after I tried it on the boys, mine probably ended up about 18")

Now you will fold and sew each piece. 

Fold the 10"x6" piece in half so that the 10" sides are lined up. Then sew a 1/4" seam along the 10" side. Turn right side out and press so that the seam is in the center of the back side. You should now have a rectangle that is approximately 10"x2 3/4". 

Fold the 3"x4" piece in half so that the 4" pieces are lined up and sew 1/4" seam along the 4" side. Turn right side out and press with the seam going dow the center back. It should now be about 4"x1 1/4".

Fold the last piece in half to make a long skinny tube. Sew a 1/4" seam on one short side and the long side, clip the corner and turn right side out. Press. 

Fold the 10" piece in half so the the short, raw edges are lined up and the front side (without the seam) is inside. Sew raw edges together, turn right side out and press center seam being careful not to press the folded edges of the bow. 

Next, fold the bow accordion style and wrap the center piece around. Make it as tight as you want it and trim of any excess. I probably trimmed off about 1/2". Fold in raw edges and whipstitch closed. Next thread the skinny strap through the back of the bow. I now tried it on my boys with a dress shirt on and trimmed it with enough overlap for the velcro. My finished length was about 17-18". I tucked the unfinished end in and sewed it closed then sewed on a piece of velcro about 1 1/2" long. I had to trim the velcro down because it was a little too wide to fit on my strap.

That's it. Now you have a cute little bow tie to put on a cute little boy. It was so quick and easy to make that I will probably make some more for my boys just to wear to church.